A Libertarian on the Problem of Representative Democracy

A Libertarian on the Problem of Representative Democracy

Give a man a fish, you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish you feed him for a lifetime. The political powers of this country and many others like it have taken complete control of the fishing industry, allowing only a certain amount of fish per person per day. The problem with this is that every year, every month and every day we allow these politicians to continue to control this industry we are receiving smaller and smaller portions of fish, so small that people are starving, or so deep in fish debt that starvation and collapse are inevitable. You may be asking yourself, why don’t the people just fish for themselves? There is plenty of ocean that is full food for them to eat, why don’t they just grab a pole, a string and a hook and head for the water? People have forgotten how, the fishing industry has been government owned for so long that people cannot remember how to fish, not to mention how complicated the politicians make it seem. People are convinced that fishing is so difficult that it isn’t worth even trying because their daily allocated government fish is more than they could ever achieve fishing on their own. If you can’t already tell I am not talking about fish, I am talking about politics. To be truly free is to live in a democracy but when the political representatives of that democratic government become corrupt that democracy turns into a dictatorship that hides behind a democratic front in order to achieve its own secret goals and the voices of the people they are suppose to be representing are lost and forgotten about.

It’s been my experience growing up in Canada that the average person could care less about politics and elections in this country. As long as we are left alone by the government people are fine with just living life the best they can without regard to what political party is in charge of their health care, education, military, police, security, and social programs, just as long as we have those things and they are maintained and not tampered with. The main concerns of most people appear to be money, status, and material possession, very little if any effort is put into forming sound political beliefs. If time is money, acquiring political information takes time, and the expected personal benefit of voting is roughly zero, a rational individual would choose to be ignorant.1 People are caring less and less because we don’t get anything new from politics today, we receive basically the same policies from the same parties every election with only small variations in things like taxation percentages or funding for social programs and almost nobody takes an interest unless a certain policy benefits them personally. Politicians know this and they use it to their advantage, theoretically they just need to find one political issue that people actually care about and propose to make it better in their campaign and the election will be won. Something as simple as proposing a tax cut can win an election. Political scientists classify about one-third of the public as “know nothings,” so the smallest thing could influence a voters opinion, something as small or completely politically irrelevant as “He’s a Christian so I’m going to vote for him.”2 Being a politically uninformed citizen is a slap in the face to democracy and a forfeit of liberty but on the other hand keeping the masses as politically uninformed as possible is the greatest benefit politicians can have because it eliminates competition.

The only job of a politician in a democratic society is simply to represent the people and nothing else. The definition of democracy is government by the people; a form of government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised directly by them or by their elected agents under a free electoral system.3 Politicians campaign for peoples support, they speak out on important issues, make promises to change things and make life better. They tell us that our concerns matter to them and if we vote for them those concerns will be alleviated. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Once elected most politicians start singing an entirely different tune and the concerns and opinions of the citizens are not only less valuable to them but often completely worthless and forgotten about. The greatest example of this would be the current President of The United States, Barrack Obama. He pledged among many other things in his campaign that if elected he would bring the troops home from Iraq and Afghanistan as soon as possible and since he was elected in 2008 he has done nothing accept send more troops into both countries.4 This is the exact opposite of representing the people, especially when 60- 70% of the American public disagree with the war in Iraq.5

With important issues like healthcare in America, the war on terror, minimum wage, homelessness, homeland security, and many others that are not being addressed with the public’s opinion in mind, we are left to wonder what the agenda of our “democratic” governments actually is. With almost 1 trillion dollars spent on the war in Iraq so far and 9 trillion so far spent on bailouts after the economic crash in the United States the American government has passed on a debt to the citizens of that country that they will pass to their children, and their children will pass to their children without even asking what the citizens wanted to do about it.6, 7 This unimaginable amount of debt forced onto American people certainly constitutes foul play in a democratic government and it is also what proves that there is a personal agenda for the government in control.

We continue to make bad decisions when voting for our democratic leaders and most of the blame is not to be put on the politicians but on the voters themselves. Yes there is a major problem with voter ignorance, but when almost half of the citizens in a country such as Canada decide to stay home on voting day it shows that we are not united on the idea of representative democracy and the policies of the parties running for office. Not much positive change can be made when over 40% of country doesn’t care who leads it.8

Libertarianism is a political theory that advocates the maximization of individual liberty in thought and action.9 Libertarianism, in history is closely tied to and often used as synonym for anarchism, but actually the two are nothing alike.10 To be free is to be able to do whatever you like whenever you like, but if we were to put that theory into practice in politics it would be anarchy and many people would suffer. They would suffer because the economy would instantly collapse, crime and poverty would rule the streets, every man, woman, and child would be on their own, so whoever has the biggest gun or the biggest gang makes all the decisions. Suffering is what we are trying to avoid, because to be constantly suffering is far from freedom. We need to realize that we are living in a society and that ultimate freedom really only needs one adjustment in order to fit into that society and function without people suffering: allow people to do whatever they want, whenever they want unless they are harming another person.

There is no need to place a libertarian on any kind of political spectrum because when it comes to things like homosexuality, abortion, religion, drugs, porn and so on libertarians believe that none of those things have anything to do with government, so go ahead and have your fill. When considering economics we believe that government should have nothing to do with the market, the market is a safe, self correcting phenomenon that will equalize itself without any government intervention.11 The governments only job is to help keep order, and to provide security for our country and the citizens of our country. People are free to live whatever life they choose and not be bothered by the government.
To be a libertarian means to be as free as possible within civil society, regardless of what kind of government, how much government, or where the government intervenes just as long as freedom and the possibility of more freedom is not taken away. The only way to have this kind of freedom is to have a government.12

If a person has no idea how to get to his destination, he can hardly expect to reach it. He might get lucky, but common sense recognizes a tight connection between knowing what you are doing and successfully doing it. Ubiquitous voter ignorance seems to apply, then, that democracy works poorly. The People ultimately in charge-the voters- are doing brain surgery while unable to pass basic anatomy.13 Politics is a very complex art that not many people know about. A successful politician may be involved in various things that all people in a society rely on, on a daily basis such as: education, health care, the economic market, military action, sanitation, security, police, international trade, Immigration, the supreme court, correctional institutions, road construction and maintenance, business, transit, and many other important everyday things that are basically the framework of society. People seem to take many of these requirements for civil society for granted and don’t take an intimate interest unless they are affected directly by government action or inaction.

The main reason for voter ignorance is the lack of political education among citizens. About half of Americans do not know that each state has two senators, and three-quarters do not know the length of their terms. About 70% can say which party controls the house, and 60% which party controls the senate. Over half cannot name their congressman, and 40% cannot name either of their senators. Slightly lower percentages know their representatives’ party affiliations. Furthermore , these low knowledge levels have been stable since the dawn of polling, and international comparisons reveal Americans’ overall political knowledge to be no more than moderately below average.14 This low level of knowledge seems astonishing considering how fundamentally important politics is to society. This leads us to ask, why was political science never an option during every citizens mandatory schooling periods as children and young adults? Surely how civilization functions is just as important as any of the other subjects taught in the educational system. Not only should one or more politics classes be optional in secondary school, they should be mandatory and after completion of these courses-regardless of age-students should then receive the right to vote. This one course or set of courses could effectively destroy all voter ignorance, provide us with intelligent voters and a large new set of post-secondary politics students that will eventually lead our country into a better future.

From the point of view of the non-voter one vote doesn’t count for much so why study the issues when you can’t change the outcome?15 People are becoming so diverse especially in a country like Canada, many different people have many different issues all over the political spectrum and all throughout this entire country. Not enough people can agree on the same issues and solutions to those issues to win an election and rarely do the people who share the same issues ever get a chance to unite and fight for their ideals. Many people have just gotten used to the problems and given up on finding solutions to them.
On top of being tens of trillions of dollars in debt and planning to run a 1.75 trillion dollar deficit in 2010, The United States of America has about a 10% official unemployment rate with an estimated unemployment rate that is over twice as high.16, 17, 18 Many people including people outside of the United States have been left without homes, jobs, food, and many of the necessities of life because of the decisions of the American government. Millions of people are suffering inside their own country and the government still makes the decisions to buy bombs and weapons and pump money into the military instead taking care of its own people and its allies. The cost of sending one U.S soldier to Iraq for one year is $390,000 and the cost of housing and feeding an average U.S citizen for a year is estimated at less than $20,000.19 Theoretically you could end poverty with amount of money that has been spent on the Afghanistan and Iraq wars. Might I mention again that the majority of the American public opposed the war in Iraq and still do.5 Where is the democracy in these decisions? I don’t remember former president Bush when campaigning for the year 2000 election supporting wars, recession, global warming, catastrophic debt and the deaths of millions of Arab people and thousands of Americans. To take some focus off the bad politics of the United States and look at one more example of government making un-democratic decisions let us consider the Kyoto Accord. The Kyoto Accord is a treaty created by the UN to lower greenhouse gas emissions, signed by the Canadian government, Canada was expected to lower its carbon emissions to 6% below the levels in 1990. As of 2006, Canada’s emissions were 22 per cent above the 1990 level and all eco-funding was cut by the UN.20 The People were in support of this treaty and it was completely ignored by Prime Minister Harper and the conservative government of Canada.

We are mad, not at democracy, but at the people who have taken democracy from us. Public opinion surveys in recent year have identified part of the explanation for this malaise. They disclose a widespread feeling among citizens that governments have become disengaged and remote and that elections alone cannot guarantee sufficient choice or accountability. Elected officials are often seen as unresponsive and out of touch even in many countries with long established and well functioning democratic regimes. Ordinary citizens feel an increasing sense of political powerlessness and express little trust in the ability of existing political institutions to address their concerns.21

It seems that the only way the governments of democratic countries will actually do what the citizens want it to do is if the government already had plans to do it anyways. The solution to the problem appears to be simple; the solution to democracy is more democracy.22 Direct democracy or “Pure” democracy is the only way we can avoid all of the problems of representational democracy. Let the citizens decide if our country needs to go to war, let us decide if and when we need to do something about health care, education, transportation, or anything else government related. We have the power to represent ourselves and let each and every one of our voices be heard. We have the power to take our own countries in the direction that the majority of people agree on.

It is possible for direct democracy to work in many ways, all that is required of it is citizen participation. People have to care, and after the extreme tyranny of many “democratic” politicians that shouldn’t be too hard. One way direct democracy can function successfully is to have a voting day, probably on a Sunday where every citizen meets at the same type of establishments that we currently use for voting and vote on a variety of issues once a month. Another way direct democracy can function successfully would be using the internet, every citizen can register an account on a government run and secure website and input his or her vote on whatever topic is at hand. People would have the right to vote on any issue, even the contents of the constitution of their country without any restrictions. Instead of politicians, lawyers and old men in suits being the only people allowed to propose changes in our country’s policies there will be doctors, scientists, teachers, and all kinds of professionals that genuinely care about issues that can make the world better that will volunteer their ideas to be judged by you and I and the rest of their country.

Great things could be achieved using this system, we could get rid of debt, fix capitalism, lower taxes, help impoverished countries, improve the environment, etc... All that needs to be done is to have a vote. When people see this system actually functioning and improving their lives voter ignorance will decrease and voter participation will increase because people will become very interested in making their lives better and easier. The reward for voting will no longer be nothing, so people will actually take time to study the issues.

As a participant in a direct democracy in Canada I would propose several new ideas to lower taxes, save the taxpayers’ money and to help pay off our debt. To start I would suggest we get rid of the Prime Minister, House of Commons, Governor General, and all aspects of representation completely from Canadian government, taxpayers would no longer need to pay for their high salaries, haircuts, and automobiles. I would propose to the people that we take our army out of Afghanistan, let America fight their own wars and we can save Canadian taxpayers money. To improve the environment I would recommend that for every tree a logging company cuts down they must plant at least one new one. To help fix poverty I would ask all of the citizens in Canada to add a percentage to their income tax in order to fund programs to help impoverished nations. These are all just ideas, and as a citizen in a pure democracy I have the right to suggest them, and you have the right to scrutinize them. Don’t forget that these ideas, however outrageous or ridiculous are just the ideas of a 21 year old political science student and anybody that knows better is free to say so. Effectively we will have a nation that is lead by the best and brightest in the entire country.

Some counter arguments to direct democracy that people would have might include that it is too complicated and that most people would not be interested in voting if they don’t understand the process of voting. Others might say that there are too many unintelligent people out there and that we cannot rest the future of our country in the hands of a majority of ignorant people. A conservative would oppose direct democracy because he/she believes that tradition is the most important thing in politics. Some might say that people do not care enough about politics enough to get involved at the level that a direct democracy would command. The biggest worry of all would be military action, what if our country is attacked, we wouldn’t have time to be able to hold a vote in order to find out what we should do about it and we would be left vulnerable to further attacks.

To these arguments there are solutions for all, but might I add that it would not be up to just me to find a solution in a direct democracy, everyone would be responsible to vote on issues that would prevent the failure of this democratic system before those issues arose. If the system itself is too complicated then let the citizens vote on ways to make it more simple and understandable, perhaps vote on whether it is worth it to have a mandatory or elective politics course in secondary school in order to increase voter knowledge. If people are worried about the competence of other voters, than hold a vote suggesting that we should make sure that during voting process both sides of the issue are accurately and informatively represented. In the case of military action we would need to vote in advance of any attacks, on back up military strategy and what laws would be in place in case of power outages, economic crashes, or anything that would put our system of voting on hold. It is up to us to plan ahead and be ready for anything that might disturb our system.

The idea is not to just throw the responsibility of voting on every issue into everyone’s face at once and say now it’s all up you, but to gradually give people the pleasure of having their opinion taken seriously and at the same value as everyone else’s. People are tired of being told what to do, people are tired of being told how to act, people are tired of shouting at the top of their lungs and not being heard. The politicians that represent representative democracy have destroyed meaning behind the theory and the only thing that is democratic about it anymore is that people choose not to care about politics. Representative democracy has been a great tool that has helped us free ourselves from tyrants, fascists, dictators, and monarchs but it is old news now, we are ready to take the next step into the future of liberty. Direct democracy is an ideology that will stand the test of time because when something goes wrong the entire nation is to blame, instead of just the one guy with the suit and the bad haircut. You can’t just sit at home in your armchair pointing the finger, this system requires you to care about making life better, and when that happens, with all the minds in the country working together, how could we go wrong?

Work Cited
1) Caplan, Bryan The Myth of the Rational Voter, (New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 2007) pg 94
2) ibid pg 95
3) Dictionary.com, http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/democracy 2010
4) Mail-Online World News, “Obama sends another 13,000 troops to Afghanistan on top of 21,000 he announced in March... Days after Nobel Peace Prize Win,” http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1220068/Obama-quietly-sends-13-000-troops-Afghanistan-21-000-announced-March.html
Obama sends another 13,000 troops to Afghanistan on top of 21,000 he announced in March... Days after Nobel Peace Prize win
5) PollingReport.com, “CNN/Opinion Research Corporation Poll,” http://www.pollingreport.com/iraq.htm Jan. 22-24, 2010
6) CNN, “War costs could total $1.6 trillion by 2009, panel estimates” http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/11/13/hidden.war.costs/

7) New York Times, “Adding Up the Government’s Total Bailout Tab,” http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2009/02/04/business/20090205-bailout-totals-graphic.html February 4, 2009
8) CBC News, “Voter turnout drops to record low,” http://www.cbc.ca/news/canadavotes/story/2008/10/15/voter-turnout.html October 15, 2008
9) Merriam Webster’s Dictionary, http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/libertarianism 2010
10) Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/libertarianism/ Sep 5, 2002
11) ibid
12) ibid
13) Caplan, Bryan The Myth of the Rational Voter, (New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 2007) pg 6
14) ibid pg 8
15) ibid pg 2
16) New York Times, Jackie Calmes, “Obama Plans Major Shifts in Spending,” http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/27/us/politics/27web-budget.html February 26, 2009
17) Trading Economics, United States Unemployment Rate, http://www.tradingeconomics.com/Economics/Unemployment-Rate.aspx?Symbol=USD

18) UsDebtClock.org, http://www.usdebtclock.org/ 2010
19) Us Spending in Iraq, http://usliberals.about.com/od/homelandsecurit1/a/IraqNumbers.htm
20) DavidSuzuki.org, Kyoto Protocol, http://www.davidsuzuki.org/climate_Change/Kyoto/
21) Leduc, Lawrence, The Politics of Direct Democracy, (Toronto: Broadview Press, 2003) pg 20
22) Caplan, Bryan The Myth of the Rational Voter, (New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 2007) pg 5